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Outlook Opens, then the instance fails

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Posted on by Adambent

Hi, I'm really new to Power Automate and would appreciate some help to fix a flow. This flow did work last month, and now it fails and I cant figure out why.

I work as a Fractional CFO for a small portfolio of startups and am looking to automate a few tasks. For one company I need to retrieve files from emails, rename them, then send them on. I have two Outlook profiles and multiple emails in each profile. The flow opened Outlook in the correct profile, selected the correct email account, and dealt with the files. At least it did last month, but now it wont.

The flow still opens Outlook in the correct profile, but it failing on selecting the correct email account. Using the "Retrieve email" it is erroring with "Argument 'Instance' must be 'Outlook instance'.

I'm guessing I have moved something out of place, or changed a connection but I cant see where.

Would really appreciate any help and guidance, but I am very new to this and not a developer so my knowledge is still very basic.

Thanks

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Power Automate Desktop

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Nived_Nambiar 18,138 Super User 2026 Season 1 on at

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Hi @Adambent

Could you please a share screenshot ?

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Adambent 4 on at

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HI @Nived_Nambiar
The screen shot below is of the flow. Each run it errors on the 'Outlook instance'. It is opening the correct Outlook profile. Retrieve mail is pointed to one of two email accounts in this profile and if it impacts the results, the is pointed to the secondary email account, not the primary, though I also tried it with the primary and it still fails at the same point.

It worked last month so I've clearly changed something in error, but cant put it right, even starting again didn't work.

Thanks for any help you can give.

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Nived_Nambiar 18,138 Super User 2026 Season 1 on at

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Hi @Adambent

seems strange, as this was working fine for few months and suddenly throws out this issue as you are passing outlook instance itself.

Does any update happens to outlook application and also PAD recently after which it stopped working ?
Also try setting the profile as default profile in outlook and try again ?

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Adambent 4 on at

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Yes there have been updates. Ive tried to rebuild it in new flows and doesn't work. It is like the Outlook Instance isn't picking up the opening of Outlook so the Retrieve Emails isn't finding the email account. How do I make sure the flow to open Outlook is actually captured within the Outlook instance?

Is it possible to create an Outlook Instance when Outlook is already open? I cant find this in any of the tutorials, but as I work with it open, it would be easier to just pick the right email account and get going.

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